Confederation of monarchies in northeast Africa from 1504 to 1821
Funj Sultanate
السلطنة الزرقاء (in Arabic) As-Saltana az-Zarqa
1504–1821
Funj branding mark (al-wasm)
The Funj Sultanate at its peak in around 1700
Status
Confederation of sultanates and dependent tribal emirates under Sennar's suzerainty
[1]
Capital
Sennar
Common languages
Arabic (official language, lingua franca and language of Islam, increasingly spoken language)[2] Nubian languages (native tongue, increasingly replaced by Arabic)[3]
Religion
Sunni Islam,[4] Coptic Christianity
Government
Islamic Monarchy
Sultan
• 1504–1533/4
Amara Dunqas (first)
• 1805–1821
Badi VII (last)
Legislature
Great Council Shura[5]
Historical era
Early modern period
• Established
1504
• Conquered by Egypt
14 June 1821
• Annexed to Egypt Province, Ottoman Empire[a]
13 February 1841
Currency
barter[c]
Preceded by
Succeeded by
Alodia
Egypt Eyalet
Today part of
Sudan Eritrea Ethiopia
^ a. Muhammad Ali of Egypt was granted the non-hereditary governorship of Sudan by an 1841 Ottoman firman.[6]
^ b. Estimate for entire area covered by modern Sudan.[7]
^ c. The Funj mostly did not mint coins and the markets rarely used coinage as a form of exchange.[8] Coinage didn't become widespread in cities until the 18th century. French surgeon J. C. Poncet, who visited Sennar in 1699, mentions the use of foreign coins such as Spanish reals.[9]
The Funj Sultanate, also known as Funjistan, Sultanate of Sennar (after its capital Sennar) or Blue Sultanate (due to the traditional Sudanese convention of referring to black people as blue)[10] (Arabic: السلطنة الزرقاء, romanized: al-Sulṭanah al-Zarqāʼ),[11] was a monarchy in what is now Sudan, northwestern Eritrea and western Ethiopia. Founded in 1504 by the Funj people, it quickly converted to Islam, although this conversion was only nominal. Until a more orthodox form of Islam took hold in the 18th century, the state remained an "African empire with a Muslim façade".[12] It reached its peak in the late 17th century, but declined and eventually fell apart in the 18th and 19th centuries. In 1821, the last sultan, greatly reduced in power, surrendered to the Ottoman Egyptian invasion without a fight.[13]
^Ofcansky, Thomas (June 1991). Helen Chapin Metz (ed.). Sudan: A Country Study. Federal Research Division. The Funj. Archived from the original on 9 January 2009.
^McHugh 1994, p. 9, "The spread of Arabic flowed not only from the dispersion of Arabs but from the unification of the Nile by a government, the Funj sultanate, that utilized Arabic as an official means of communication, and from the use of Arabic as a trade language."
^James 2008, pp. 68–69.
^Trimingham, J. Spencer (1996). "Islam in Sub-Saharan Africa, till the 19th century". The Last Great Muslim Empires. History of the Muslim World, 3. Abbreviated and adapted by F. R. C. Bagley (2nd ed.). Princeton, NJ: Markus Wiener Publishers. p. 167. ISBN 978-1-55876-112-4. The date when the Funj rulers adopted Islam is not known, but must have been fairly soon after the foundation of Sennār, because they then entered into relations with Muslim groups over a wide area.
^Welch, Galbraith (1949). North African Prelude: The First Seven Thousand Years(snippet view). New York: W. Morrow. p. 463. OCLC 413248. Retrieved 12 August 2010. The government was semirepublican; when a sultan died the great council picked a successor from among the royal children. Then—presumably to keep the peace—they killed all the rest.
^"Text Viewer" فرمان سلطاني إلى محمد علي بتقليده حكم السودان بغير حق التوارث [Sultanic Firman to Muhammad Ali Appointing Him Ruler of the Sudan Without Hereditary Rights] (in Arabic). Bibliotheca Alexandrina: Memory of Modern Egypt Digital Archive. Retrieved 12 August 2010.
^Avakov, Alexander V. (2010). Two Thousand Years of Economic Statistics: World Population, GDP, and PPP. New York: Algora Publishing. p. 18. ISBN 978-0-87586-750-2.
^Anderson, Julie R. (2008). "A Mamluk Coin from Kulubnarti, Sudan" (PDF). British Museum Studies in Ancient Egypt and Sudan (10): 68. Retrieved 12 August 2010. Much further to the south, the Funj Sultanate based in Sennar (1504/5–1820), rarely minted coins and the markets did not normally use coinage as a form of exchange. Foreign coins themselves were commodities and frequently kept for jewellery. Units of items such as gold, grain, iron, cloth and salt had specific values and were used for trade, particularly on a local level.
^Pinkerton, John (1814). "Poncet's Journey to Abyssinia". A General Collection of the Best and Most Interesting Voyages and Travels in All Parts of the World. Vol. 15. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme. p. 71. OCLC 1397394.
^Bender, M. Lionel (1983). "Color Term Encoding in a Special Lexical Domain: Sudanese Arabic Skin Colors". Anthropological Linguistics. 25 (1): 19–27. JSTOR 30027653. Retrieved 15 March 2021.
^Ogot 1999, p. 91
^Loimeier 2013, p. 141.
^Cite error: The named reference Moorehead was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
The FunjSultanate, also known as Funjistan, Sultanate of Sennar (after its capital Sennar) or Blue Sultanate (due to the traditional Sudanese convention...
Sudan from 1762 to 1821. During this period the ruling family of the FunjSultanate of Sennar continued to reign, while actual power was exercised by the...
southern Sudan, which lasted from the 6th to the early 16th century. The FunjSultanate was founded in 1504 and at its peak ruled over an area covering parts...
or the Funj in c. 1500. Centered around the mountainous region of Fazughli on the Blue Nile and serving as a buffer between the Funjsultanate and the...
The Funj are an ethnic group in present-day Sudan. The Funj set up the FunjSultanate with Abdallah Jamma and ruled the area for several centuries. The...
late 18th and early 19th centuries, during the decline of the northern FunjSultanate. In the 19th century, the Shilluk were affected by military assaults...
al-Masalit Dar Qimr FunjSultanate of Sinnar (Sennar) Kordofan Ajuran Sultanate, in southern Somalia and eastern Ethiopia Adal Sultanate, in western Somaliland...
Alodia, the last holdout of Christian Nubia, was destroyed by the FunjSultanate in 1504. During the 19th century the Sanusi order was highly involved...
the 19th centuries, central and eastern Sudan were dominated by the Funjsultanate, while Darfur ruled the west and the Ottomans the east. In 1811, Mamluks...
main port and seizing Suakin from the allied FunjSultanate in what is now Sudan. In 1573 the Adal Sultanate attempted to invade Ethiopia again however...
was pressure from the Shilluk that drove the Funj people north where they would establish the FunjSultanate. The Dinka remained in the Sudd area, maintaining...
the 3rd cataract, including Dongola, had been annexed by the Islamic FunjSultanate by the early 16th century. Makuria is much better known than its neighbor...
Banten Sultanate Flag of Cirebon Sultanate Flag of Mataram Sultanate Flag of Aceh Sultanate Flag of Gowa Sultanate Flag of Surakarta Sultanate Flag of...
in establishing an independent state, but they were defeated by the FunjSultanate in 1504 and thereafter ruled over the Butana as vassals until the Egyptian...
allied with the Sultanate of Darfur and the Kingdom of Takali against the Funj, but the capitulation of Takali ended the war in the Funj's favour. In the...
The Funj Chronicle is an Arabic history of the FunjSultanate and the early years of Ottoman rule in the Sudan. It originally covered the period from...
Ethiopian–Sudanese borderlands. After the destruction of Soba, the Funj established the Sultanate of Sennar, ushering in a period of Islamization and Arabization...
early 13th century, the Delhi Sultanate conquered the northern Indian subcontinent, while Turkic dynasties like the Sultanate of Rum and Artuqids conquered...
Muhammad Tayrab, Sultan (?–1785/6) Abd al-Rahman, Sultan (1785/6–c.1801) FunjSultanate (complete list) – Badi III, Sultan (1692–1716) Unsa III, Sultan (1719–1720)...
Records, 16 (1933), 55-66. A.C.S. Peacock (2012): "The Ottomans and the Funjsultanate in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries". Bulletin of the School...
including the former capital Dongola, had been annexed by the Islamic FunjSultanate by the early 16th century. Over time, the Nubians gradually converted...
borderlands) effectively ruled while the Funj sultans were their puppets. Shortly afterwards the sultanate began to fragment; by the early 19th century...
of an invader from the south, the Funj. In 1504 CE, the Funj defeated Abdallah Jammah and founded the Funjsultanate. The date of the foundation of the...
Badi VII (reigned 1805–1821) was the last ruler of the FunjSultanate. Badi offered no resistance to Ismail Pasha, who had led the khedive army of his...
goats, et cetera. Historically, it was part of Alodia and later the FunjSultanate of Sinnar. Butana was known as the "Island of Meroë" when it was part...
Global Information
